


above all else, desire

by honeyinthenight



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Episode Fix-It: s15e20 Carry On, M/M, but not awful and violent, fix it fic bc i couldn't live without writing one, fluff but it's a journey, the major character death is the one we all know
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-11
Updated: 2021-01-11
Packaged: 2021-03-16 03:01:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,130
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28699587
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/honeyinthenight/pseuds/honeyinthenight
Summary: In which Dean finds himself trying to live the life Castiel had died for and failing miserably; in which Dean, for the final time, goes after his angel.
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester
Comments: 8
Kudos: 55





	1. i. - vii.

**Author's Note:**

> it's true i am a finale denialist, but i became interested in the idea of like, yes, what if cas still confessed and died and, yes, what if dean didn't go after cas right away, and what if it was all rooted in fear but also in the love dean felt that he could no longer ignore or repress. what if dean conquered his wordlessness? so i wrote this. i want dean and cas to be happy but also think about their shit and this is that for me.
> 
> my little fic playlist, in this order: 
> 
> tolerate it - taylor swift  
> why we ever (acoustic) - hayley williams  
> mortal - baby rose  
> all yours - mankind forever
> 
> (15x18 obviously brought me back into spn after being gone a min, so forgive me if my lore is off or if i bend the rules a little too much.)

i.

Dean is on the other side now, looking out into the forest surrounding him, the wind sifting through the trees. The ground in front of him dips into a green valley, wildflowers peeking out amidst the taller grass. Dean feels along his body—still his, yes, the dusty green jacket, the brown boots usually muddy, now clean. _It’s time to move on_ , he tells himself and begins the long walk into the unfamiliar. There’s no guide, no introduction to Heaven this time. Or is it Heaven? Dean has his suspicions.

The air is crisp and cool, the sun warm on his skin. As he moves through the valley, his thoughts move to Castiel. His blue eyes, his dark hair, the dip of his neck when he unbuttons the top two buttons of his shirt. Rare to see, but Dean had seen it a few times—caught Castiel mid-adjustments, shifting his clothes which so often acted as his armor and his best descriptor. Cas coming just around the corner of the library, maybe, or walking past the door of Castiel’s room a little bit ajar and there—the angel, _his_ angel, undone. Not bleeding, not exhausted, not strategizing but Castiel coming out of the shower, hair wet and sparkling, or Castiel curled up with a book (his favorite at the time, the collected poems of Louise Glück) in the library at midnight, swept up in his thoughts, private, his own little whirlpool. The perfect peak of collarbone, the freshly shaved skin along his jaw, his lips pressed in thought. It was in these moments Dean realized he loved him.

 _Loves him_ , he corrects himself, as the sides of the valley around him start to grow as tall as his shoulders.

It’s easy for Dean to get caught in wordlessness—on the precipice of speaking the truth until his throat chokes, language caught at the back of his brain. What comes out is usually something worse, sharper, more acidic. Why was it easier for Dean to blame Castiel for his mother’s death than to tell him what he had been feeling? Dean trudges onward, a little wooden cabin quickly coming into view ahead.

 _It’s different now_ , he tells himself. All those times he thought he would have to begin living without Castiel, he didn’t end up having to—always found wandering down deserted roads, calling for help from anonymous phone booths.

The first few weeks after Castiel was taken by the Empty, sleep was impossible. Posted up all night, Dean waited, staring at his phone. As time went on, Castiel's absence was a bottomless pit. The empty bottles of alcohol piled up at his feet. He hadn’t showered in a week or so, his stench filling up the room. _Let’s just ask Jack_ , Sam begged. It really could be that simple. It could. Dean told him to fuck off and Sam never brought it up again.

Sam was right. Dean could pray, but whenever he tried, the weight of what had happened between him and Castiel in those final moments settled in. _Why does this sound like a goodbye?_ Dean had asked, his brain was scrambling for a better way out, anything other than the plan Castiel was revealing slowly, lovingly. _Why does it sound like a goodbye I’ve been cheated out of? Why does it sound like a goodbye I’m going to regret?_ Castiel’s eyes, round and full of tears, granted Dean a moment to imagine he could actually be someone’s happiness, something he had never thought possible. To look at him and love him? To have gone through these twelve years of pain and anguish and still, yes, to love him?

Castiel’s _I love you_ came and went with a flash and he was gone.

Maybe the truth was that Dean was unprepared to see Castiel again. On his final night in the library, Dean slipped into a second’s sleep so deep, he found himself standing at the old fishing deck, searching the horizon. He jerked his head up, blinked twice. Though Dean could’ve sworn it was real, the bunker shifted back into place around him again. He was alone.

ii.

_Happiness isn’t in the having. It’s in just being. It’s in just saying it._ Saying it. Dean’s arrived at the cabin which is sparsely furnished with a bed, a desk, and a kitchen table. On the desk, there’s a note:

_I thought you might want a place to call home. Look outside again. C_

Dean’s hands are shaking as he pulls the sheet of paper close to his chest. Castiel is here. Not wasting away in the Empty, but here, within his reach. _Cas could be mine_ , he thinks. Dean places his jacket on the bed, the air too warm now, and looks around more carefully. He wondered how it would feel to live alone for the first time in his life. Even when they only had motels, there was always Sam in the bed across from him or his father writing in his journal late into the night, a fizzing lamp burning fitfully away into the dawn. Dean runs his hands over the bed frame. He could choose to be alone this time, but he didn’t have to be. Dean walks outside and finds the Impala waiting for him as if it had been there the whole time. Another gift, Dean thinks and opens the door to get behind the wheel. The smell is just as it always has been: leathery, a lingering note of sweat, gun powder, and pine trees. Dean breathes in deep and opens his eyes to find another note on the steering wheel. Same paper, same handwriting:

_Come find me when you’re ready. I have been waiting for you. C_

iii.

Waiting—an act of stationary yearning, of pausing in the middle of a desire and stewing, simmering until just the right time. And that’s if the right time even comes—you could be waiting forever, as it seems like Castiel has. Or Dean has, for the matter, choosing to wake up each day anyway while Castiel lingered at the edges of his mind, always an inch or so from his fingertips. Dean understood the feeling behind a word like _barely_ , a word like _almost_. But he’s en route now, gunning up the Impala as the motor rumbles to life and Dean starts to drive. The control in driving is what Dean loves the most. You get in and go—drive down a few predetermined strips of concrete, only a few feet away from the ground, a second from stopping, anywhere, and being back in your body again.

There’s only one road in Heaven, but his favorite cassette is already in the tape deck—the Led Zeppelin mix he’d made for Castiel. When making it, Dean had even figured out how to record his own voice right before the tracks to give some context. He was pretty proud of himself. _How the fuck do I get this to uh oh shit okay, it’s on, sorry so uh hey Cas it’s me I’m here to give you the Dean Winchester tour of the finer things in life_ , his own voice from years ago zips through the Impala before the first song plays. _First track is Ramble On_. Dean can’t help but laugh. He was really out here making fucking mixtapes for the guy, and yet he couldn’t find the words to let Castiel know how he was feeling for him, even after everything they’d been through, even then. The time wasted, regretted. _And now’s the time, the time is now_ , Zepp sings, _I gotta keep searching for my baby._

iv.

One of Dean’s favorite Castiel memories is one that never got to happen. It’s 7 AM, the morning after Castiel’s I love you. Dean is not normally an early riser, but Castiel is, starting a pot of coffee for all three of them before sitting at the kitchen table, sometimes finishing a book, sometimes flipping through a newspaper. His trench coat and tie are draped over the chair next to him. His white shirt in disarray, skin fresh from the shower he doesn’t need to take but simply does so out of enjoyment. ( _One of the things I enjoyed most in my time as a human_ , Castiel had confided in him soon after stealing another angel’s grace.)

Dean walks into the kitchen, padding in barefoot and blurry eyed to get out him and Castiel’s favorite mugs. One with a cowboy, the other with honeybees. One milk, no sugar, the other black. _Hello, Dean_ , Castiel greets him, surprised to see him up at this time, watching Dean carefully as he approaches with the mugs and sits in the chair across from him. It’s a greeting, Dean realizes, that he could hear for the rest of his life and never grow tired of it—the low rumble of Castiel’s voice, the way Dean’s heart flutters at the sound after all this time. Dean wraps his hands around his mug. In his fantasy, the words still get lost, but the intention is true. Castiel, he starts, about last night. Dean tentatively reaches his hand across the table toward Castiel, extending a finger to trace the backs of his knuckles. This is the kind of touch he had only ever dreamed of doing—no rush and no expiration date, no expectation except the joy of simply doing it. Castiel doesn’t move his hand away, his eyes wide and trained on Dean, his lips parting at the realization of what’s about to happen. And Dean leans forward, giving in, surrendering.

v. 

You’d think Heaven’s scenery would be fucking elaborate because it’s, you know, Heaven, but it’s as if Dean is taking any other drive across empty, woodsy America. _The sky is as blue as Cas’ eyes_ , he thinks but then kicks himself for even going there. What if the notes are the final blow? What if it’s not really Castiel? Dean remembers Lucifer’s trick over the phone and how it stung—all of the hope in his body that had been building as he ran up the stairs, climbed them two at a time, just to be greeted with the face of someone he hates instead of his best friend.

He still owes it to Castiel to know for sure.

 _It’s DJ Dean coming to you…. not so live but almost_ , his pre-recorded voice interrupts his thoughts. _Fuck maybe you don’t know what a DJ is yet Cas and if you don’t I’ve failed you but anyway it’s me and here’s…_

Dean has a vision of himself in his room, door locked, talking away to the cassette recorder under the amber light of his desk. It was easier to talk to Castiel when he wasn’t there. To begin to tell the truth. The prayers were earnest in the beginning, focused solely on requests: _Cas, Sammy’s in trouble, get your ass down here_ or _Cas we need your help on a case_. But it began to change. Sometimes, Dean loved to just talk. _Cas, I’m watching another Western and I hate to tell you but uh you’ve been missing out in Heaven because look at the fucking hats these guys get to wear_ or, when the nightmares picked up again from time to time—of Mary on fire on the ceiling, of Sam withered away mid-trials—a small _Cas, they’re at it again_ and Dean found himself whisked away to the lake, the steady and warm hand on his shoulder from the man in the trench coat.

Small intimacies Dean learned to catalogue, now all cast in the shadow of Castiel’s love for him—there were so many more to consider now. Dean had never thought Castiel was capable of the love he wanted. With the confirmation laid bare, he was speechless. Castiel had little to offer to Dean in a moment of disillusionment, once again smothered by Chuck’s narrative in what feels like years ago, now. All their fighting, all their blood, sweat, and tears for nothing. But Castiel, longing to place both hands on either side of Dean’s face and pull him closer, did what he could with his words: _You asked what about all of this was real._ And with a glance, Dean’s body stiff with rage, his shoulders tensed in the doorway. _We are._

Dean walked away. Now, he wished he hadn’t.

_Of course I forgive you. Of course._

vi.

When Chuck was defeated, most of the world went back to normal. Jack, the new God, had a much more hands off approach. After those first few weeks of mourning, Sam put all of his energy into trying to help Dean settle down into this new life. He coaxed Dean into waking up early to go running with him (begrudgingly, at first, and only with the promise of a big breakfast right after). They binged television shows in the afternoon, they ate dinner together in the evening. Sometimes they still searched for cases but lazily. Dean grew more inclined to stay home with their new dog, drink at their local bar on the weekends. One morning, Dean caught Sam’s search history—“top colleges usa” “best cities in the world to settle down in”—and knew that the rest of the world, even his brother, was moving on in a way he found he couldn’t.

Dean considered praying again. Little prayers as practice for maybe nothing, everything: _Cas you could’ve told me about the deal there’s no problem to big for us when we’re together_ or _Cas I hope you’re uh hope you’re okay um I have so much to say to you man I don’t know how or when_ or _Cas did you really mean what you said and how could you—_ It didn’t help. As far as he knew, he was praying to a dead man. Dreaming of one, too—the electrifying closeness of Castiel’s mouth, the sudden sight of his hip as he stretched his arms above him in one of Dean’s old t-shirts—embarrassed, Dean shuffled into more than a few icy showers, forehead pressed to the slick tile in relief. 

_You could just ask_ , he reminded himself. Dean banished the thought and tried to live the life Castiel had imagined for him, the one he gave his life for.

The job application sat on Dean’s desk for days until he finally flipped through it. He wasn’t sure what had gotten into him that day, sitting in the Impala outside of a little diner in town, staring at the help wanted sign posted in the window. They wanted cooks. It would be simple for him: Dean had started cooking as a hobby in the past few months, laying dish after dish in front of Sam with a big smile, a flourish, his apron caked in sauce and flour. He’d always had a hunch food was his love language. While Sam praised Dean for each dish, Dean couldn’t help but glance over at the third chair—empty. At the end of his contentment, a ledge appeared. _Cas_ , he’d think. _What would I have cooked for Cas?_

The application asked him questions he couldn’t answer. Past experience? Guns, monsters, blood. Referrals? All dead, only Sam. Even something as simple as an address wasn’t something he could give. Castiel’s sacrifice has to mean something, he told himself. And he lied his way through the form. And he signed it at the end. And the next day he promised himself he would turn it in, slip into the interview with a charm and a smile, and it would be his. And somewhere Castiel would be watching on, somewhere he would be proud.

vii.

The truth is Dean’s final death was easy, but first, the day begins with a nightmare.

It’s the reoccurring one that’s been plaguing Dean since Castiel was taken. They’re both in the bunker, Dean braced against the table with whiskey in hand as Castiel lingers over the threshold of the room—not quite entering or exiting, bristling with quiet frustration. _You don’t trust me_ , Castiel says. The room behind Cas seems to shimmer like a mirage. _Something always goes wrong, Dean, you know this_ , Castiel continues. Losing his mother the first time had been enough pain to carry for the rest of his life—losing her a second time is unimaginable. But here he was. Here they were. The mirage behind him begins to loosen and ooze. _Yeah well, why does that something always seem to be you?_ Dean spits. Castiel’s face crumbles, his shoulders sagging, eyes slipping to the ground. The mirage splits open into a black hole, the Empty’s black hole, and it slithers out an arm, slippery with black mucus to tease, curl a finger around Castiel’s neck and begin to pull. Dean realizes what’s about to happen a second too late and then he wakes up, sweating and gasping, hands gripping his sheets.

It is a Thursday morning. _Cas, they’re at it again_ , he thinks to the cold side of his bed, to the empty room, to the distance in between himself and the love—

Could he say it? Was today the day he could finally say it?

Dean gets out of bed and gives himself permission to do the thing he’s been avoiding since his death: go into Castiel’s bedroom in the bunker. Step in. Take in his little personal universe. Walking down the hallway, Dean’s fingers trail the wall as he travels three doors down to the one he hasn’t been able to open in months.

The bed is unmade. Dean had never pegged Castiel as someone who’s messy, but there’s lingering traces of him all over the room: a molding mug on the bedside table, an empty plate with some food remnants sitting in the corner. Dean traces his fingers along the folds in the blanket thrown on top, wondering why Castiel left in such a hurry or wondering if the messiness is evidence of Castiel luxuriating in his early, early mornings. Sleeping even when he didn’t need to sleep anymore, going through old human rituals for comfort, for familiarity. 

There’s the framed photo of Dean, Jack, and Sam that Castiel had insisted on taking after a long night of drinking. Sam and Jack’s smiles are big while Dean gives a sly glance, a little smirk, all eyes on Castiel, the photographer, wearing his polaroid camera like a necklace the first few weeks he got it. When Dean opens the bedside table drawer, he finds more polaroids: of Dean mid-chew discussing the period relevancy of Westworld, of Sam’s brow furrowed, mouth twisted at his computer, of Jack chewing happily on cereal grinning a big wide toothy smile—the kind, it seems like, Castiel brought forward in all of those he loved.

There’s another of Dean—from when they were sitting across the couch from each other deep in conversation about which Matrix movie is better, and Castiel pulled out his camera quickly, snapping this look of absolute adoration Dean gave him when Castiel made a reference he understood. _Dean, I have Netflix_ , Castiel had said. Dean grinned so wide. The camera flashed. The angel, his angel.

In many ways, the room is too sparse. There should be more in here. But Castiel had never been allowed to stay long—their missions consumed their time, and whatever else was left, Dean’s anger consumed that, too. Each time Dean lost Castiel and each time he came back, Dean focused less on enjoying whatever they had together, instead preferring to lock his fists around it, grit his teeth into it, suffocating him with a devotion so infused with pain and anger and desperation, it kept them apart. Dean was never powerful enough, though, to push back death. _I was never enough_ , he thinks.

Dean’s eyes drift to the ledge near Castiel’s bed. What would’ve been a window in any other normal home is a flat slab of wall, indented. On the ledge sits one potted plant. Dean takes it into his hands—maybe a fern or a cactus or whatever the fuck (Dean has never had a green thumb) but whatever it was, the little plant never stood a chance. Dean couldn’t figure out why Castiel would bring something like this into a room with no light. Frustrated, at first, at Castiel's irresponsibility, Dean reminds himself that this plant had meant something to Castiel, and Dean, in all of his denial, had again abandoned something Castiel had loved.

He should’ve opened the door sooner.

Dean, pot and plant balanced in his two hands, runs back out into the hallway, up the main stairs and out the front door. It’s freezing. It’s the middle of winter. _Cas left me in the middle of winter_ , he thinks. The sun is bright, though, and Dean, shivering and shaking, biting back tears, lifts the plant to the light. “Come on come on you son of a bitch come on come on,” he whispers. Outside the bunker’s dim atmosphere, the plant appears even more shriveled, the stalk a dry husk, brown leaves long dropped and withered.

A carefully placed popsicle stick protrudes from the potted soil imbued with Castiel’s handwriting, a label: _Rose of Sharon_. Biblical, of course. Something to remind Castiel of his very first home. On the other side of the stick, the same handwriting: _The desert will bloom like a rose_.

Exhaustion floods Dean’s body. He doesn’t know what he expected. A resurrection, maybe. A second chance. But he had gotten so many chances with Castiel, every day spent alongside him was never enough. Dean was greedy. Too greedy, he’d judged and never even thought to ask for more. And at this final loss, Dean felt like Castiel's sacrifice was the last note in their story. Had he wanted to go after Castiel? Of course he did. But it was the enormity of the emotion behind it, previously left unspoken, that stalled him.

But there is no life for Dean without Castiel. The words begin to bubble up at the back of this throat again like they had this morning: love, love of, love of his— “Love of my life,” he says. 

Dean walks back into the bunker and places the plant on the table, curling his fists around the edge of it till his knuckles were white. Will he be able to say what he needs to, or will he just be a disappointment, tongue locked once again?

Is Castiel even still alive out there, Empty or not?

Dean makes the call.

 _Jack_ , he mumbles. _You know what I need. Get me to him, wherever he is._

Dean isn’t even sure if, after everything that happened between them, Jack would even help him. It’s embarrassing to ask a favor of someone he had treated so poorly. There are a few minutes of stillness. Dean remains resolute, inevitably recalling—as much as he tries to push it out of his heart—the Empty’s black tendrils swallowing Castiel whole. And then suddenly, Dean is snapped up in a light and seconds later finds himself at the green, green valley.


	2. viii. - x.

viii.

Castiel stood at the edge of what now would be called the sea. At that time, the language didn’t exist to describe it yet—this pooling, sloshing water fizzling at the edges of the sand, reaching in with its long wet fingers to pull out little gifts, offerings: shells, pearls, vertebrae of small creatures who had reached an end the sea would never meet. The earth and everything on it remains, in God’s mind, finite and cyclical.

Wet and dry—God’s newest obsession: letting opposites lap up against one another to create new sensations. The perfect line the sea drew across the sand, darkening the land between him and it, drew Castiel’s attention. There was something inviting about this new ground—delicious, even, in its unknown properties. Castiel reached a hand into the wet sand, broke through its seal with a pop. Cool to the touch, solid yet giving. Upon pulling away, the place where his hand had been remained hollow. The earth kept his mark for a the briefest moment until the tide rolled in. 

For millennia, distance is what Castiel specialized in. A soldier, like Castiel, is a phantom limb. A soldier is an object, a shield. All time existed simultaneously—blurred together into a seamless film of newness and light, often war and bloodshed—until the day he unearthed Dean Winchester from the pit.

Castiel didn’t need to leave a mark, but the handprint on Dean’s shoulder was a claim, a sign of intention. At first glance of Dean’s soul, Castiel understood selfishness. His hand burned against Dean as he pulled him up to earth and, underneath his grave, let his palms go white hot as he pieced together Dean’s body. 

He became more and more curious about this man. What kind of creature had God created that he would ask angels to love them also, if not as much? At first, humanity seemed inferior, stupid, and full of pride. Dean’s jokes, his casual blasphemy, and his anger rising up at times when Castiel deemed it inappropriate. Wasn’t Dean looking at the grand scheme of things? The lives Dean fought for were often just a necessary and expected cost when in service to Heaven.

 _Stubbornness_ , Castiel had identified as the answer, _and goodness_. Two qualities imbued to the righteous man— _his_ righteous man—and his profound ability to love. 

Inexplicably, Dean’s lectures on “personal space” allowed Castiel to dare to think of his body, not as a weapon, but as an invitation for love. See: intimacy. See also: vulnerability. See: two beings choosing a dangerous closeness in the dim light of a motel bathroom. The word was not yet there—just on the tip of his tongue. The feeling so unfamiliar he approached it cautiously as if it were a wild animal. 

Castiel thought again about the grip of the wet sand around his palm. It could’ve been yesterday that he was standing at the threshold of God’s new creation. But it wasn’t. And when Dean wrapped his arms around Castiel for the first time, he knew it was over. The path his life would take solidified around him as time met its fixed point in Dean Winchester. He had fallen, and he would continue to fall as long as Dean was alive and walking the earth.

It was on earth that Castiel learned about touch. 

Dean’s hand to his cheek, stroking his thigh: touch could be tender. Dean’s grip on his shoulder, his arms wrapped around his waist: touch could be earnest. And with every touch, Castiel’s defenses were peeled away, his intuition curved toward this man—often angry, often frustrating, but rarely selfish, his heart a live wire, unguarded. _I’ll go with you_ , Castiel had said more than once. _Of course._ He had confessed his love so many times already. _Of course. I’ll go with you._

vix.

A second cabin comes into view—just off the road, a garden fully in bloom marking its presence like a fire in the night. A figure is kneeling in the dirt, only the back of a head—a mess of dark hair—and shoulders—broad, covered in a white t-shirt—are visible from the road. Bees buzzing, head spinning: _it’s Cas_ , Dean thinks. His heart threatens to rip out of his chest. Dean stops the Impala some distance away, opens his door, and begins to walk over to Castiel.

There’s something about arriving in front of Castiel, not shrouded in metal, not misconstrued by an object too familiar for both of them, but in his own body, bare. Dean recalls the story of Moses taking off his shoes on holy ground. It’s as if his body knows where to go before his head follows—floating, effervescent, a kind of full absence one can only describe as longing. The ache in Dean’s chest before he even realizes it’s there. A long thread tied between him and his angel and somewhere someone is tugging. Dean’s feet step off the pavement and onto the gravel path, stones crunching underneath his shoes. At the sound, Castiel stands up from where he was kneeling. Dean can see his shoulders tense and then, as the thread between them gets shorter and shorter, they ease.

A burden has been lifted.

With Castiel only a few feet away, Dean begins to unravel.

x.

A memory appears to them both, as if it were a ghost.

_“You just fucking…” Dean yelled, storming through the bunker. The back of Dean’s head was still bleeding as he held an old t-shirt to it. “You can’t—”_

_“Dean,” Castiel tried to keep his voice even, “you’re bleeding. Let me help you.”_

_It was their first and only hunt with Castiel as a human and Dean had spent the majority of the past week vetoing the idea until eventually he was overruled and, yes, a simple case cropped up and, yes, “Dean, I’m not a baby,” and, sure, Dean set his rules and parameters for Castiel’s well-being and, reluctantly (on Dean’s part), they were off. They had bigger things to worry about—primarily, the angel filling out Sam’s insides that no one knew about except Dean—but Castiel had been eager. Dean, surprisingly willing._

_To say the hunt went bad was an understatement. A few shitty leads, a botched spell, all three of them knocked on their ass by a poltergeist—“Just a fucking poltergeist,” Dean complained, “We’ve locked away the fucking Devil and we messed up a ghost case.” If anything, Dean was embarrassed of himself. In the middle of the fight, he was thrown against the wall so hard, he blacked out, coming to, finally, in the back of the Impala, his head and chest cradled in Castiel’s arms. Castiel was whispering something over him in a language he couldn’t understand—Enochian, maybe. It was the kind of moment Dean wished for. Something he fantasized about alone. But the sharpness of the hunt, and his own shame at how ill prepared he was, soured it. This wasn’t how he wanted it to happen. Castiel, still thinking Dean was out, leaned down and pressed his lips to his forehead in a simple, quiet kiss._

_Shock shot through Dean as he ripped himself out of Castiel’s arms and huddled to the other side of the Impala. Castiel went silent, curling in on himself. He could feel the wall between them building up again. As soon as they pulled up to the bunker, Dean stormed out of the car._

_Castiel followed Dean to his room, his rage and shame emanating from him like heat. Normally, Castiel would given Dean space, but if there was anything Castiel was learning about being human, it was the temporary nature of each burning emotion. It was the finite pleasures and pains of the earth._

_“Dean, please,” Castiel pleaded. “Talk to me.”_

_Dean spun around. “You can’t, you just can’t touch a guy like that.”_

_Castiel laughed, raising both his hands in exasperation. “‘A guy’? Dean, what do you think is going on here between us?”_

_“I don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about.”_

_“What do you think,” Castiel continued, more tenderly this time, stepping forward cautiously, “has been happening here?” He reached out a tentative hand and laid it on Dean’s arms which were locked around his own stomach as if holding something inside. The bloody t-shirt had fallen to the ground._

_Dean didn’t know, if he was being honest, and that not knowing scared the shit out of him. It was how Dean could go from standing in any given room feeling exhausted to standing in any given room feeling exhausted but steady on his own two feet, secure in his own body, when he catches Castiel’s look—his constant presence, his I will go where you go. There was confidence and friendship there, and then… something else. Dean’s heart jumped despite his injury. He watched Castiel’s hand rest on his arm as if no one had ever touched him before in his life. Maybe no one had. Dean’s eyes wide, unblinking, breath coming out in short gasps._

_“I wanted to protect you, I,” Dean thought of Castiel’s ribs snapping under the foot of evil, he thought of Castiel’s eyes slipping closed and never opening up to him again, “I failed—I fail you. Always. I’m, uh, I’m not worthy of, uh, of...”_

_You. He can’t say it, Dean’s throat dry. Castiel thought of the push and pull between the sea and the sand—inevitable, state altering. The quiet hummed between them and Castiel curled his hand a little tighter around Dean's arm._

_“Nothing could be further from the truth.” Castiel knew this would take time—if it ever happened at all. But Castiel would dream. “Dean, let me take care of you tonight.” And as he lead Dean to the bathroom, Dean leaned into his side, his skin still buzzing in the place where Castiel’s lips had been._

vix.

The desperation to be close to Castiel nearly renders Dean’s brain incoherent. It’s seeing him covered in the black Empty and seeing him now standing whole, in one piece, content under the sun. He looks so good in a pair of blue jeans Dean almost laughs. _Cas in fucking Levi’s_ , he thinks and adds it to the memory vault. Castiel doesn’t say anything as he watches Dean approach and stop just a foot away. It’s almost too good. A Thomas fucking Kinkade painting. Dean has doubts, but above all, the relief at the sight of Castiel fills him to completion and turns all his bones to jelly.

“You’re wondering if I’m really me,” Castiel says, tilting his head, regarding Dean carefully.

Dean laughs, his voice hoarse when he finally speaks. “So you’re a mind reader still, huh?”

“I just know you,” Castiel smiles and adds, “It is really me.”

 _I know_ , Dean thinks. _I can feel it._ Dean gestures to their left. “Nice, uh, nice garden,” he grins a little uneasy, a little breathless, trying hard to be casual, as if he hasn’t just been pulled into another dimensional plane just to see Castiel. “You’ve always wanted one.”

Castiel goes along with it for now. The conversation will turn, for better or worse, eventually. It always does.

“Yes,” he agrees and reluctantly moves his eyes away from Dean over to his three garden beds packed with violets, sweet peas, and a few ripening tomatoes dripping off the vine. “It’s a start. Though I didn’t expect for it to happen this way.” He gestures all around him.

“How did you…”

“Jack,” Castiel supplies, the question already known between them. “As soon as Jack became God, he dissolved the Empty. He came to get me. He,” he pauses here. “We built all of this.”

“Is this Heaven?” Dean asks. He’s still unsure. His experience of Heaven so far has been either corporate or pod-like in its structure—with each person getting their own piece of the pie but separate, lonely.

“Yes and no. It’s not the Heaven we’ve experienced in the past, but it’s the Heaven I’ve always wanted. Less barriers, less restrictions.” Castiel hesitates. “I didn’t expect you to be here so soon. I wanted—I know that you’ve always wanted a real life, Dean. A good one.”

“Yeah, and I came up here to get it back.” A shudder and a sigh escape him, his words swirling warm and low in his throat. “Without you, Cas, there’s no… there’s nothing for me.” He pauses, looks around. “You know, I gotta admit I also pictured this differently—”

“You pictured it?” Castiel cut in so quickly that the words seem to surprise him, too. His blush deepens.

“Man, you have no idea,” Dean laughs and looks down to the ground, scrubbing the back of his neck with his hand. “I had to… stop for a while. It was—I didn’t know if angels could, you know—”

“Fall in love,” Castiel says softly. 

And there it is, the space between them as slippery and smooth as silk. Dean could walk up to him right now, take his face in his hands, and yes—finally—kiss him, press his lips to his and kiss him. But he waited. What could be so easy for Dean to communicate with his body, he knew it was more important to do it verbally. For him, for Castiel. 

Dean brings a hand up to the side of Castiel’s face and marvels at the way his skin feels—the transition from smooth cheekbone to rough stubble, the slight pressure when Castiel leans into his hand that almost makes Dean’s knees give in. He lets his hand fall, tracing the Castiel’s collarbone through his t-shirt.

“You know,” Dean continues, “you missed my incredible cooking.”

“Missed it?” Castiel grabs Dean’s hand and intertwines his fingers with it, tugging him toward the cabin. “You seem to underestimate me.” 

Castiel pulls Dean through the door and into the small cabin. The layout is a little different than his—the bedroom is the biggest room, sealed shut with two doors, directly across from them. The living room was to the left, and a small kitchen to the right. Castiel had put a greenhouse just off the kitchen which, as Dean peaked through the fogged, wet window, looked filled with greenery of every kind. Castiel draws Dean toward the kitchen where there’s a few bowls laid out on the counter, some measuring spoons, and what looks like a bag of flour. 

“I was about to summon a pasta machine when Jack told me you had called.”

“ _Summon_ a pasta machine?” Dean pries open Castiel’s refrigerator to take a peak. 

“No Target in Heaven, Dean,” Castiel replies dryly, rummaging through his kitchen cabinet. Dean hears the clinking of two glasses, see a bottle of whiskey out of the corner of his eye. Dean finds it hard not to longer on Castiel’s hands as he twists off the top of the whiskey, his long fingers sliding along the bottle’s neck and down to its base.

A tomato sits perfect on one of the shelves in the refrigerator. “One of yours?” Dean asks and, at the little nod, he picks it up and sinks his teeth into it, the juice dripping down his chin. Castiel has stopped pouring to watch Dean, his eyes moving from his lips and to the wetness of his chin. 

Castiel gives a little smirk. “Don’t make me kiss that off of you.”

Dean takes another bite and doesn’t think twice about the juice finding its way down the front of his shirt. “Maybe I won’t.” He breaks into a sweet, sly grin. “Maybe I will.”

They watch each other as the room stills around them. Castiel has never looked so beautiful, and Dean has never felt so happy. It feels impossible—the unchecked joy Dean is feeling, the way both of them navigate the knowledge of their mutual love, in this moment, as if they’ve been doing it with each other their entire lives. Dean’s doubt begins to creep back in. He wipes his chin with his hand and takes a deep breath.

“Cas,” Dean starts, “what you said to me…”

“You don’t have to say anything.”

Castiel was so used to filling in the gaps for Dean—years of catching his longing, held just barely by his grace, while Dean physically and emotionally pushed him away, shuffled them into silence, distance. Castiel, at times, felt like he knew nothing of the man in front of him. But it was the not-quite prayers, the way Dean’s voice strained at _Cas, I..._ till the line between them went dead that often brought Castiel back in from the cold. 

“No,” Dean puts up a hand, his voice stern. “I need to. There are things I’ve wanted to say for so long—hell, I thought I never could, but Cas, you’re… there’s no one like you. You’re the love,” the word breaks apart as Dean’s voice chokes, “of my life.” The string between them is pulled taut and Dean tugs Castiel close, gripping his arm, playing with the hem of his t-shirt between his two fingers, focusing—the softness, the warmth of Castiel’s chest near his. “I’m sorry, Cas, I’m, uh—I had this whole thing planned and I’m—”

“I built that cabin for you.”

Dean locks eyes with Castiel and Castiel, for the first time since Dean’s arrival, lets himself drink in the sight of Dean Winchester: freckled and green eyed, flustered and needy. He places a hand on his waist—a dream, yes, and when Castiel could dream, briefly, as a human, it was of this.

“Jack said we could just speak it into existence, of course, like the others. But I imagined my hands,” Cas lays his other hand flat across Dean’s chest, watching it move and stretch along Dean’s skin as if he’s never seen anything more beautiful in his life. “My hands building something for you. Piece by piece. Like I rebuilt you. It was all I had. I didn’t know when or if I’d ever see you again. It was difficult to… let go.”

“And then I heard your prayers,” Castiel nearly laughs, the joy catching in his voice. “All the nights I didn’t—couldn’t—come to you. Dean, I will always hear you.” 

“Cas,” Dean mumbles in a haze both of them are feeling, the world dimming around their two bodies pressed against the refrigerator in Castiel’s tiny kitchen in Castiel’s big, vast Heaven. “How do you make me feel this way, so full, so—”

There is no answer to this question. For Castiel, feelings came into being with force, a flooding, rushing river, until he learned, with time, to temper them—balance them and the truth and come out with something resembling a new part of who he was. With Dean, Castiel is a dam broken open. 

He thinks of the beginning of the world and the end of it and of Dean, somewhere in the middle of it all consistently significant, stubborn, and loyal, a meddling beam of light pushing out of its narrative until the narrative, in its imperfect and cynical state, becomes obsolete. _What kind of love_ , Castiel wonders. What kind of love makes a man split apart until he is whole? _You shall leave your mother and father and cleave to your husband and the two shall become one flesh._ Castiel presses his lips to Dean’s in earnestness, and Dean yields underneath him as he, too, is nothing but water. The dryness of Dean’s lips, the wetness of his mouth—a sensation Castiel will carry with him for the rest of time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hope you enjoyed, let me know your thoughts xo
> 
> may upload an additional little prose poemy epilogue if i ever get it figured out!
> 
> hmu @ my tumblr: honeynthenight


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